


taking my time ('cause you took everything from me)

by nonbinarynino



Series: my LBSC fics! [3]
Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Destruction, Endgame Luka Couffaine/Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug, F/M, Gabriel Agreste | Papillon | Hawk Moth Wins, Hurt/Comfort, Identity Reveal, Implied/Referenced Mass Violence, Minor Injuries, Minor Violence, minor profanity
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-30
Updated: 2020-09-30
Packaged: 2021-03-08 00:01:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,731
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26736289
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nonbinarynino/pseuds/nonbinarynino
Summary: By the time that Ladybug had gotten there, Hawkmoth had been dangling Chat’s ring between his fingers, like he had just won his favorite game.And then, Hawkmoth had put the ring on, and he had destroyed Paris. Just like that.(For the LBSC Sprint Fic Challenge Prompt: "What I remember the most is hollering her name. And the sirens wailed as we ran like hell down a strange trail.")
Relationships: Luka Couffaine/Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug
Series: my LBSC fics! [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1943359
Comments: 5
Kudos: 66
Collections: LBSCSprintFicChallenge





	taking my time ('cause you took everything from me)

**Author's Note:**

> i'm sorry, but you cannot pay me enough to spell hawk moth correctly
> 
> write me on tumblr: sapphicmarinette

After the last building falls, Marinette can only stand and watch.

At first, she hears nothing but her own heartbeat pulsing in her ears. She feels nothing but the body shakes that won’t quit, the wobble of her lip that she can’t even attempt to stop. She tries to take deep breaths, the way her old therapist taught her when she gets like this, but she’s too numb to tell if she’s doing it right.

She wishes that she could say that it was a huge, dramatic battle. She wishes that she could say that she and the rest of Paris stood up against Hawkmoth and fought their hearts out. For what’s right. For the future. For everything.

But nobody knew Hawkmoth’s plan of attack until it was far too late. By the time that Ladybug had gotten there, Hawkmoth had been dangling Chat’s ring between his fingers, like he had just won his favorite game. Marinette tries not to remember the way that Adrien had stood there, dazed and horrified. She tries not to remember the way the dots had connected.

And then, Hawkmoth had put the ring on, and he had destroyed Paris. Just like that. Marinette remembers the rubble, the fires, the screaming. She remembers brief, searing pain. She remembers trying to help the ones who were too injured to run away. There had been too many of them.

Marinette doesn’t remember much after that. A selfish part of her hopes that those memories never come back, even when the shock fades.

 _Marinette,_ a voice says, and it sounds familiar. _Marinette._

She swallows, unable to do anything but stare at the ground. If she looks up, she’ll see the burnt buildings, the flipped cars, the policemen who don’t even know where to start. She’ll see the destruction that happened because she was too late.

_Marinette!_

Is that Tikki, somewhere, begging her to get out of here, to transform, to fight back? To fight this losing game over and over, until Hawkmoth has her miraculous between his fingers, too? Is it even worth it anymore? Should she even be Ladybug?

“Marinette,” the voice says again, and she doesn’t realize that it’s being spoken out loud until two hands grip her shoulders. She flinches so hard that his hands disappear as quickly as they had shown up. “Marinette, sweetheart, it’s me.”

It’s Luka.

His hair is messy, as though he’s been biking without a helmet. There’s a big bandage on his cheek, and a little bit of blood has dried underneath his bottom lip. Marinette tries to focus on his face, but her vision keeps blurring out. When it is clear, though, she sees his expression. He looks worried, tired, and scared.

Marinette sure feels all those things, too.

“We need to leave,” he tells her. “It’s not safe here, and you’re hurt. I can take you somewhere else and patch you up, okay? Do you feel comfortable on the back of my bike right now?”

Is she hurt? She reaches out to touch her arm and doesn’t expect it to hurt, but it does. Oh. She tries to answer his question, but all that comes out is, “I failed.”

Luka stops in his tracks. “What?”

“I failed,” she repeats, and the sentiment is already becoming a basic, impartial fact. The sky is blue. The grass is green. Hawkmoth won because of Marinette. “I failed.”

“That’s not true,” he insists. He looks more confused than anything, as if trying to deduce if she has a hero complex or not. It’s close enough to the truth. “You’re an amazing girl, Marinette, I’ve never forgotten that, but there’s nothing that you could have done to prevent this. Hell, I bet I had a bigger part to play in this than you did.”

Marinette almost tells him _that’s not true,_ his own words against him. She almost tells him _I chose you, after all._ But she doesn’t say either of those things. “I’m comfortable being on the back of your bike,” she says instead, and lets him lead her over to it. She slides in behind him, wrapping her arms around his waist and pressing her face into his shoulder.

“Come on, angel,” he says. He doesn’t put his helmet back on, which is so uncharacteristic for him that he must have lost it. “I’ll get us out of this place.”

“I believe you,” Marinette tells him, feeling so small, before he starts to ride. She hears his heavy breathing, fast and erratic. She hears the sirens behind them, which seem to have not stopped at all for hours. And then, she hears nothing but the sound of wind whipping in her ears.

* * *

Once Luka reaches somewhere that has been untouched by the chaos – a park bench by the bike path, with minimal smoke in the air and sirens so far away that they are barely audible – he pulls over. He offers her a hand to get off, but the shock has faded enough that she doesn’t need to take it.

“Here,” he says, guiding his bike next to the bench and then sitting down on it. “Sit down. I don’t have a huge first aid kit on me, but I can clean up your arm well enough.”

Marinette sits next to him, so close that their bodies are lined up. To be blunt, she’s way too tired to care about propriety at this point. She doesn’t say anything as he pulls up her sleeve and begins to clean away the dried blood. He mumbles a _sorry, sweetheart_ when the alcohol stings, and kisses the bandage after he applies it.

“I’m going to see if either of our families have had to evacuate,” Luka explains afterwards, pulling out his phone. Marinette pats down her pockets, stopping once she feels the bulk of her own. She doesn’t think that her hands have stopped shaking enough to use it, but it’s good to know that it’s there. “If not, we can go there. If they did… I don’t know, Mari, but we’ll figure something out.” The thought of her family bakery _not_ being okay… it’s just too much to bear, especially considering that the last hopes for Paris – the other miraculouses – are in her bedroom.

“I can’t believe Hawkmoth won,” she says. “I never thought that would happen, you know? I guess I always thought that someday… someday we’d get him.”

“He hasn’t won yet,” Luka says. Even though he needs his phone to see if their homes are safe (and, hell, to see if his _family_ is safe) he puts it down in favor of looking at her. “Not for real. He has Chat Noir’s miraculous, and that’s horrible, but that’s all he has. He doesn’t have Ladybug’s, or any of their other team members’.”

Marinette scratches at her chin, not realizing that she’s crying until her hand comes back wet. “How can I convince any of them to follow me anymore?” she asks, talking more to herself than to him. “How can I, when I let my partner get taken?”

“What?” Luka asks, reaching out to grab her hands in his. His hands are warm, somehow, even though it’s freezing out. “Marinette, what are you talking about?”

“I did this,” she says, the emotions all hitting her at once. Now, instead of _worriedtiredscared,_ she feels _worriedtiredscaredguiltyheartbrokenhopeless._ “Tikki was telling me all week about how she felt like something big was coming. I… I listened to her, sure, but I thought she meant “akuma attack” big, not “Hawkmoth destroys the city” big. I could have prepared more. I could have stopped it!”

“You’re Ladybug,” he says, quiet. Marinette nods jerkily, unable to care about how the secret she holds so close is out. Why does it matter, now that everything is over? Sure, she’ll put up a fight, like she always does, but there’s no chance. They won’t _win._

Luka doesn’t say anything for a long time. He simply gathers her into his arms and presses her close, burying his face into her hair. She wonders if it smells more like ash or blood, and the thought is so horrid that her crying worsens into hyperventilating. Today just sucks. She wishes she could just say that today was just a normal bad day, but it’s so much more than that. She’s not even sure that she’ll be able to utilize her normal bad-day coping mechanisms, like bath bombs and rom-coms, once it’s all over. The entire bakery could be rubble, burnt down and lost forever.

Luka lets her cry, holding her even when her hyperventilating eventually subsides into the occasional sniffle and deep breath. “I am so sorry,” he tells her. “You’re fifteen. You don’t deserve to have the entirety of Paris on your shoulders at fifteen.”

“Thank you,” she says, because it’s close enough to agreeing with him – that she shouldn’t have to deal with this – without actually admitting that Master Fu put her in an unfair spot.

“None of this is your fault, angel,” he tells her. “You can’t expect to be out there as Ladybug 24/7. What were you supposed to do? Exhaust yourself to the point of passing out, and then get your miraculous taken?” At the mention of her earrings, Marinette reaches up to ensure they’re still in her ears. They are. Good.

“I don’t know,” she says, unable to argue with him but unable to agree, either. “Not this. I wasn’t supposed to do this.”

“There is _nothing_ that you could have done,” Luka insists, with an intense sincerity that makes Marinette grow silent. “This might be the bridge of the song, but it’s not the final verse. We can still fix this.”

“How?” _It’s hopeless, isn’t it?_

“I’m going to call my parents, and if you’re not feeling up for a phone call, I can call yours, too,” Luka says. Usually, he is so easygoing and indecisive, even when it comes to picking where to eat, that it’s interesting to see him like this. He’s in charge. “And then, we’re going to go sit down together, get everyone that you think should be there, and we’ll make a plan. Okay?”

“Okay,” she says.

(Her parents cry when they hear that she’s alright. When they tell her that it’s safe at home, that nothing has been touched, Marinette feels as though they might actually have a shot.)


End file.
